Animation Took My Dream... and My Future. Please Help

My name is Morghan Prude. I am a writer, artist and animation production worker. This post is hard to make, but I’ve hit rock bottom, and I need to set aside my pride and ask for help from the animation community and animation fans who care about the crew behind the shows they love.

I’m looking for a helping hand and mutual aid support as I try to financially recover from years in the animation industry. I’m in $20,000 of survival and medical debt, money I had to borrow just to make ends meet and escape an abusive cycle. I was hospitalized due to the stress I’ve been under, and I’m still trying to pay the debts of that emergency room incident.

I’ve worked on so many shows and characters you know and love. Spongebob, Mickey, Randy Cunningham, Hailey’s On It, Ducktales, and more.

I had a Hollywood fairytale big break: When I was 20, I wrote a fan song for a Disney show I adored, Randy Cunningham: Ninth Grade Ninja. The creators saw it, loved it, and asked to use it in the series. Disney paid me $1,000 for my song, score, and IP. At the time, I was just so happy to be a part of the process. But now, I understand that my inexperience and lack of industry rate knowledge allowed me to be taken advantage of.

I was offered an internship to work at Titmouse, the studio animating

Randy Cunningham. Elated, I moved to LA from Alabama. When I got there, I worked for 5 months for no pay. I drove into Los Angeles at 4 AM to open the office, and would close the office as late as 8PM. But I was thankful for the opportunity to work in animation at all, so I accepted this situation.

I later landed a job at Nickelodeon working on Spongebob… A dream come true for a kid that grew up on Nick. Instead of the dream job I hoped for, I found a toxic environment where I was cursed out behind closed doors. I was told I could never enter a director’s office, and instructed to send my white coworker to speak to him on my behalf. I was told to my face by this person "I don't want to look at you. I don't want to see you. Do not pass my doorframe." I was warned that if I spoke to anyone about the abuse I was going through, my name would be blacklisted from the industry. Finally, exhausted from the mistreatment, I asked for a meeting with a third party to address the harassment. In response, the team stopped speaking to me entirely and iced me out, making it impossible for me to continue my job. I was told to “go home and think about” whether I wanted to continue. I was forced to quit.

I felt very lucky to work at Disney Television Animation afterward and finally found better teams, and kinder people, working on shows like Ducktales, Hailey’s On It and Big City Greens. However, I also faced other moments of mistreatment. I was verbally abused by Disney executives, and the people who wanted to help me couldn’t because of office politics. I was offered condolences for the verbal abuse, but nobody was able to alleviate that suffering.

I was so worn down by my experience in animation, I never thought I deserved better, so I just accepted the treatment, and I didn’t want to accept I was also being severely underpaid. The pay was so unfair that there’s now an active class action lawsuit against the company for underpaying women in the exact roles I held.

The lack of fair pay plus the cost of living in LA completely drained my savings, and when I could no longer afford rent, I had to leave. I had to call it. I cashed out my retirement from my first civilian job and paid for a plane ticket and moving expenses on credit cards to escape the cycle.

This industry exhausted me and took everything I have. I have been drained of my finances, my passion, my creativity and my love for the industry and the shows I used to love so much.

I am trying to rebuild my life in Ohio, but the stress I am under from this financial burden left me hospitalized. I can’t get out of this alone.

Every dollar of this GoFundMe will go toward paying off my medical and survival financial burden.

If you’ve ever loved SpongeBob SquarePants, Mickey Mouse, Big City Greens, or DuckTales, you’ve enjoyed shows I’ve directly contributed to. I was underpaid for years while helping bring the characters you love to life… and your support now would mean the world. Even the smallest donation can help me get back on my feet and out of this cycle.

Thank you so much for reading and thank you to everyone who has been kind to me on this journey. <3